yea i don't even understand why people are entertaning the notion of Nadal and how successful he'll be on clay this season. He could be off for 2 years and only Djokovic and Almagro are threats to beat him on clay. Yea Almagro hasn't accomplished it yet, but i'd rate him Nadal's second toughest outing on clay.

He'll probably win Vina Del Mar. Possibly Sao Paulo provided he has a good draw, I won't be surprised if he loses, Almagro, Bellucci and Wawrinka can push him to the limits. And there really is a slim chance for Acapulco considering the above three plus David Ferrer is there to grind him.

He has a chance. There will be nobody at Vina del Mar to beat him, and that's where he should be most vulnerable. Sao Paulo has stronger competition, but Rafa should be in better shape by then and that trend continues in Acapulco where he could meet Ferrer, but Rafa should be in great form by that week.

It's a great way to get back on tour for Nadal. Start out with challenger level opponents and build up your game while slowly facing tougher and tougher competition.

yea i don't even understand why people are entertaning the notion of Nadal and how successful he'll be on clay this season. He could be off for 2 years and only Djokovic and Almagro are threats to beat him on clay. Yea Almagro hasn't accomplished it yet, but i'd rate him Nadal's second toughest outing on clay.

Click to expand...

WHAT? The same Almagro that put in the choke of the century against Ferrer at the AO. Almagro could be up 6-0 5-0 and I'd still take Nadal.

yea i don't even understand why people are entertaning the notion of Nadal and how successful he'll be on clay this season. He could be off for 2 years and only Djokovic and Almagro are threats to beat him on clay. Yea Almagro hasn't accomplished it yet, but i'd rate him Nadal's second toughest outing on clay.

Click to expand...

Almagro? I'd give Federer a bigger chance of beating Nadal on clay. Also Murray, Ferrer, Tsonga, Berdych, Tipsarevic, Del Potro and more players. Almagro is spanish, which means he's a lapdog AND he has a one handed backhand which means he's very vulnerable on clay against Nadal. Not to mention that his level is just way below that of Nadal.

Sometimes I think people make these extravagant, extreme, ridiculous predictions just so they can gloat harder if the opposite occurs. Why not just watch and see what happens?

:-?

Click to expand...

Eh, I was just messing with Clarky.

Truth is:

-I have no idea how Nadal will do or will he even play all of those tourneys (or any of them for that matter)

-I don't care how Nadal will do in these mickey mouse tournaments (which are irrelevant in the big picture) either way so there will be no "gloating" from me, if it's on TV I'll watch them but that's about it.

Almagro? I'd give Federer a bigger chance of beating Nadal on clay. Also Murray, Ferrer, Tsonga, Berdych, Tipsarevic, Del Potro and more players. Almagro is spanish, which means he's a lapdog AND he has a one handed backhand which means he's very vulnerable on clay against Nadal. Not to mention that his level is just way below that of Nadal.

Click to expand...

Almagro is a mental midget in general, not Nadal's lapdog.

Almagro's game actually matches up well with Nadal, his 1HBH is excellent at dealing with high balls (he's a CC specialist) and he usually does give Nadal tough matches on clay in comparison to the field.

Almagro's game actually matches up well with Nadal, his 1HBH is excellent at dealing with high balls (he's a CC specialist) and he usually does give Nadal tough matches on clay in comparison to the field.

Almagro? I'd give Federer a bigger chance of beating Nadal on clay. Also Murray, Ferrer, Tsonga, Berdych, Tipsarevic, Del Potro and more players. Almagro is spanish, which means he's a lapdog AND he has a one handed backhand which means he's very vulnerable on clay against Nadal. Not to mention that his level is just way below that of Nadal.

Click to expand...

The last two times he's faced Nadal on clay, Almagro had him on the ropes but just couldn't finish it out. He's been closer to defeating, hell taking SETS off Nadal than Tsonga, Berdych, Tips, and Del Potro on clay. He doesn't roll over and die against Nadal on clay.

Almagro's game actually matches up well with Nadal, his 1HBH is excellent at dealing with high balls (he's a CC specialist) and he usually does give Nadal tough matches on clay in comparison to the field.

Almagro's game actually matches up well with Nadal, his 1HBH is excellent at dealing with high balls (he's a CC specialist) and he usually does give Nadal tough matches on clay in comparison to the field.

Click to expand...

No offense Zagor because I think you are a good poster, but Almagro is not Nadal's lapdog? Has Almagro ever defeated Nadal in any match? Who cares if their matches are "close?"

I think he goes undefeated. At least until a possible match against Ferrer, even then I put him fav, since he will have many matches under his belt by then. I think he will probably tank IW and Miami, and then get back to MC. This could be an epic clay sweep from Rafa...I wouldn't be the least bit surprised.

night matches yes.....doubles match tomorrow at 6 chile time....4 us eastern...same with singles on wednesday...tennis channel is going to pick up the singles match...i'm hoping doubles will be streamed somewhere tomorrow.....don't get tc right now...had horrible streaming over weekend with dc...anybody else?

cant wait to see Rafa, really can't see him losing to anybody in this tournament. Only Juan Monaco might offer his some sort of resistance but unless Rafa's knees are bothering him and he has to retire, he will win this tournament. PS blog updates for Vina del Mar, Zagreb, and Montpellier if anyone is interested!

No offense Zagor because I think you are a good poster, but Almagro is not Nadal's lapdog? Has Almagro ever defeated Nadal in any match? Who cares if their matches are "close?"

Click to expand...

Zagor is right. Almagro actually puts up better scorelines against Nadal on clay than the vast majority of the field. Nobody competed with Nadal better at the 2010 RG than Almagro in the QF. Almagro went down 7-6 7-6 6-4 but he really competed well with Nadal. Nadal was simply better than him in key moments.

For lapdog, check out how Monaco has performed against Nadal on clay court matches.

No offense Zagor because I think you are a good poster, but Almagro is not Nadal's lapdog? Has Almagro ever defeated Nadal in any match? Who cares if their matches are "close?"

Click to expand...

I would consider Almagro to be Nadal's lapdog if he showed mental weakness merely against Nadal but that's not the case, the guy's a mental midget in general, Nadal being one of the mentally toughest player on tour just exposes him more so than most others when they play.

Overall I find the notion of Almagro, Ferrer, Verdasco, Lopez being Nadal's Spanish lapdogs to be a myth, they don't bend over against Nadal because he's their Spanish alpha male or something, the reason they do so poorly against him is because he's a much better player than them, it has nothing to do with the fact that they're the same nationality as Nadal (heck Fed owns them even more than Nadal and he's Swiss, they have zero wins against Fed combined).

I also disagreed with that poster claiming Nadal is a bad match-up for Almagro by default because he has a 1HBH, that is simply not the case, not all 1HBH are the same and Almagro is one of the rare players on tour who can actually hold his own from the baseline against Nadal and trade groundies with him on somewhat equal terms, of course his mental weakness, almost nonexistant transition to the net, poor fitness etc. do him in against Nadal but his BH helds up probably better than any other 1HBH on tour when facing Nadal on clay.

Here's the thing. She hates Djokovic and thus can never ever forgive Nadal for losing to him 7 times in a row. No matter what he does, he can't wipe out those losses, so she has turned on her favourite player for losing to a guy she hates 7 times in a row. And further more she kind of doesn't want him to make any reasonable return. She wants him to be utterly finished so she can chalk off those 7 losses as Nadal totally finished losing those matches. If Nadal comes back and has a few more years on tour winning slams then those 7 losses were somewhere in Nadal's best years. She doesn't want that, she wants to make excuses for those matches which are - 1, Nadal was totally finished playing on 90 year old knees, and 2, that Djokovic started doping in 2011 even though if he was doping it's more likely he started earlier, at least as far back as 2009.

Click to expand...

Your first sentence was one thing you got right in this post.

You also got the second bolded part right as well.

And I do want Nadal to come back and do well; I just don't believe he will. Until he can be competitive again against even the 100th ranked player in the world, then I will believe he's not finished. I'm not getting my hopes up that he can beat anyone at all at this point. I'm not sure why that bothers you so much considering you don't even like Nadal.

And I do want Nadal to come back and do well; I just don't believe he will. Until he can be competitive again against even the 100th ranked player in the world, then I will believe he's not finished. I'm not getting my hopes up that he can beat anyone at all at this point. I'm not sure why that bothers you so much considering you don't even like Nadal.

Click to expand...

Ok, I got one thing right but in fact I got two things right. :lol:

Oh come on, you're ridiculous and you know it. Last year even before the injury you were going on about him being lucky to make the semis of any clay events. I mean really? Competitive against the 100th player? That's a laugh. Even if he comes back and beats Djokovic again at MC and Rome you will still maintain he is finished etc. He beat everyone with the loss of one set last red clay season and you still weren't happy :lol:

And if Djokovic started doping in 2011 that's interesting. Because you now say everyone dopes, Nadal included. Which means if Djokovic STARTED in 2011 like you claim, prior to that, the poor sod was a clean player competing against dopers like Nadal and Federer. Even with that massive disadvantage he won a slam and several masters and made it as high as number 2. Then as soon as he makes things fair, evens the playing field by doing what Nads and Fed had been doing all along, he starts winning left, right and centre and becomes number 1. If Only he hadn't been cheated all those years, Nadal would probably still be searching for a US Open, and AO title and be sitting on about 8 slams with Djokovic on around 9.

Oh come on, you're ridiculous and you know it. Last year even before the injury you were going on about him being lucky to make the semis of any clay events. I mean really? Competitive against the 100th player? That's a laugh. Even if he comes back and beats Djokovic again at MC and Rome you will still maintain he is finished etc. He beat everyone with the loss of one set last red clay season and you still weren't happy :lol:

And if Djokovic started doping in 2011 that's interesting. Because you now say everyone dopes, Nadal included. Which means if Djokovic STARTED in 2011 like you claim, prior to that, the poor sod was a clean player competing against dopers like Nadal and Federer. Even with that massive disadvantage he won a slam and several masters and made it as high as number 2. Then as soon as he makes things fair, evens the playing field by doing what Nads and Fed had been doing all along, he starts winning left, right and centre and becomes number 1. If Only he hadn't been cheated all those years, Nadal would probably still be searching for a US Open, and AO title and be sitting on about 8 slams with Djokovic on around 9.

Click to expand...

I don't think so. Why does it bug you so much that I don't go the **** route and behave like a pom pom waving fangirl?

He did lose to the 100th ranked player in the world at Wimby, you know. He must not be too competitive, or at a high enough level losing to one and done scrubs like Rosol.

He won't be beating any of the top players any time soon especially Lance. Do you honestly think he has any chance at all of beating any of the top 4 guys? I don't.

And we will never agree on Dr. Igor's best pupil. I have my doubts and am not a sucker, so I don't think he's clean. You won't change my mind about that, and I won't change your mind from thinking he's clean.

Again, why do you care what I say about Nadal considering you can't stand him? Why does it bother you so much when I say I think he's done?

Oh, and you have said that you think Nadal dopes. It's ok for you to think he's on peds, but the second I say I think Lance is on peds you get all bent out of shape. I mean, according to you, Nadal is some sort of ped fuelled Frankenstein whose very DNA has been changed by the amount of peds he's on. Lol.

It depends A LOT on how he feels physically after his first matches in Chile.

If the pain is manageable I don't see why he can't win 2 out of 3.

If not, I doubt he will even play all 3.

Click to expand...

I don't think pain is the right word for when you're on rehab. Pain is more physical, and requires an injury or illness, unless its a mental pain. Since Nadal was not injured, nor is he sick, he should not be feeling any pain whatsoever. He should feel an urge for drugs usage though.